


this is the way you left me

by majorshipper



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Character Study, Drama, Episode Tag, Gen, Introspection, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-21
Updated: 2011-05-21
Packaged: 2017-10-19 16:29:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/202885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/majorshipper/pseuds/majorshipper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spoilers for everything up to and including 6x22. Castiel POV; what has he become?</p>
            </blockquote>





	this is the way you left me

**Author's Note:**

> After that ending, there was no way I wasn't writing something. This is probably a bit disjointed, considering it was written at 3am after rewatching the finale again.

One minute all is calm.

He takes flight, satisfied that his Father is not here in this city where people brush up against him like the wind.

And the next, there’s nothing but water. Waves crash and for one horrifying minute the angel doesn’t know what to do. He freezes, locks up, the frozen salt water swallowing him whole. The salt tastes like acid on his tongue and stings his eyes and he scrambles but there is nothing below his feet except more water.

Foam splashes in his face, and he sputters ( _is this being human_ ) trying to rid himself of the taste. He stretches his feet, searching for something to hold onto. His head slips under the water and he feels his arms flail, instinct kicking in and he scrambles for what feels like up. His vessel needs air, he needs to think.

His fingers claw at water and he feels this human brain getting distant, losing the will to fight along with the oxygen. He should be able to stop this, to just _leave_ but his wings feel heavy and water-logged and he’s _terrified_.

Involuntarily, his eyes snap open and all he sees is darkness. Bubbles erupt from his mouth and he frantically wills himself upwards, away from the darkness.

His foot brushes something and again and suddenly he sees light, murky but attainable. He channels as much Grace as he can into this failing human body and heads for the light.

He claws at the surface and gasps as he breathes in oxygen and hope.

Truly desperate, he unfurls his wings and thinks of a beach, anywhere.

The next moment all is calm again. Safety is the shift of sand under him as he collapses and the deadly water nips at his feet, foam catching his heels like the looming end of the world.

He stays far away from the oceans after that.

 

 

Dean’s words are murky, muted, insincere. _I can do anything_ , he thinks, and then thinks of his friends, the ones he’s lost ( _killed_ ). He thinks of faces, so many, vessels and humans and demons and abominations.

He thinks of what he must look like, in a mirror. Would Jimmy recognize his own body?

He thinks of Dean’s face, _Well, I’m sorry too then_ , thinks of pleading to a dead God.

“Don’t make me lose you too,” the man in front of him says. The one who was the Righteous Man, the man who was family( _everything_ ) but now has forsaken him. Just like all the rest, all those he once called family. Betrayal feels like death, he thinks. Death on his fingers, death and blood and holy righteous fire.

Power curls under his nails, an electric surge that itches and tugs at his skin, whispers promises of absolute power. He feels invincible.

“You don’t need this kind of juice anymore, Cas. Get rid of it, before it kills us all!”

Hate bubbles where emotions once never existed, anger and pride and things that once were sin, before they destroyed the rules.

“You’re just saying that because I won. Because you’re afraid,” he says, and steps towards Dean. Behind him, Sam picks up the fallen angelic blade, and more righteous anger shoots through him.

“You’re not my family, Dean. I have no family.”

Dimly he registers the emotions that Dean has always given away freely on his face, dimly he feels the blade slice through skin and his body. He yanks out the blade, the handle feels foreign and cold. Behind him, he can feel Sam struggling, suffering under the onslaught of memories he released.

He knows, now. It makes sense. He understands, he understands it all.

He’s God. ( _God has no family; no family except that which he has created_ )

Whispers slip in his mind, promises of revenge and power and control, no more inability, no more stooping to the level of demons, no more anything. He thinks he hears a voice like what used to be his, something that whispers a quiet _no_.

Castiel, the angel, once, long ago, heard that absolute power corrupts absolutely.

( _The road to hell is paved with good intentions; it’s a slippery slope; Lucifer fell because he sought to be greater than their Father._ )

“I’m your new God. A better one. So you will bow down, and profess your love to me, your Lord, or I shall destroy you.”

 

He does not believe in fate. He doesn’t believe in Winchesters anymore. He doesn’t hold out faith that his father lives.

God has no room for anything but his power.

 

( _Castiel tastes salt and acid on the back of his tongue and there’s nothing under his feet but an abyss. power is like sunshine and it feels like the sand of a distant beach. the angel makes a deal. He walks away._ )


End file.
